7 Signs You’re Eating Too Much Fiber

Author's Bio: Marcie Vaske, MS, LN, CNS

7 signs you're eating too much fiber.

Now, fiber is amazing for your gut, for your blood sugar, and even your heart health. But have you ever stopped to think, am I getting too much fiber? And the answer is yes. You can overdo on fiber and so your body or your gut particularly will give you some signs and symptoms that will instigate you to stop using so much fiber.

Today we're going to dig into 7 signs that you might be eating too much fiber.

But before we begin, my name is Marcie Vaske. I'm a functional licensed nutritionist with Oswald Digestive Clinic. At Oswald Digestive Clinic, we deal with a lot of people questioning this exact question, should I be having more fiber?

Am I actually getting too much fiber?

I'm going to link our website here where you can easily make an initial appointment. And I'm also going to link our free guide, which is Five Ways to Improve Your Gut Health.

So without further ado, let's just dig right into the topic. I'm going to share with you seven signs your body may be giving you to say, Hey, hold up on that fiber.

[Video Transcript Below Video - it is the same information]

7 Signs You're Eating Too Much Fiber

Bloating and Gas

Number one, which maybe some of you've already guessed, this is bloating and gas. If you've ever felt like your gut is kind of really bloated after you're eating or it's making a lot of strange noises just being really loud and gurgly, this could actually be that the fiber you've consumed is just sitting there and fermenting in your gut. Now, while fiber and foods with fiber in them like beans, broccoli, even fruits containing fiber as they all do, they're healthy, right? We want to be eating them, but oftentimes they can be culprits for some pretty intense bloating and gas.

Constipation or Diarrhea

Now, another sign that your body will give you is about constipation and diarrhea. And oftentimes if you're struggling with constipation, you'll hear, well, maybe you're not eating enough fiber, so eat some more fiber, and this can completely backfire on you. Oftentimes, we go too hard, too fast with the fibers that we're consuming, particularly insoluble fibers, and they actually bulk it up so much that you become even more constipated. Or on the other hand, if you're eating a lot of soluble fibers and you're struggling with diarrhea, this can really increase the amount of stool that you have. So really finding the fine balance there when you're struggling with constipation or diarrhea is going to be really important when consuming fiber.

Abdominal Cramping

Now, the next sign of your body saying, Hey, hold up on that fiber is going to be abdominal cramping. So if you have had severe pains or sharp stabbing pains after you're eating, this could just be your body's way of saying, hold up too much, too fast, slow down, and cut down on the amount of fiber.

Feeling Heavy or Overly Full After Meals

The next sign will be a feeling of overly full or even feeling really heavy after eating a meal. Now, amazing thing and great thing about fiber is that it actually fills us up and makes us feel full, but if we're eating fiber in excess, we can maybe just too much for your digestive tract or digestive system to really be able to tolerate, and so it's going to ferment and you're going to have more bloating, gas, and just that feeling of heaviness and fullness.

Nutrient Malabsorption

Now, another symptom, and this might be a little bit less known, is that fiber can impact the way that we are absorbing nutrients. So if you're taking fiber supplements or even eating high fiber starches that are high in folates, this can inhibit the absorption of certain minerals and vitamins. So inhibiting things like calcium, magnesium, and iron. So if you're starting to feel like you're eating a great diet, but you're having really low energy or your blood labs look a little bit skewed, take a look at how much fiber you're eating because as I said at the beginning of the video, yeah, fiber is amazing for us and we definitely need fiber, but we can definitely do too much of it.

Frequent Bathroom Trips

Now, the next tip that your body will give you or sign is going to be frequent bathroom trips. So this happens when we're getting excess fiber and the body is just trying to rid it and move it through the digestive system. And so you might be feeling like you are going more frequently so you have loose stools or just going several times a day, or you have the feeling that you have to go kind of this weighted down heavy feeling in your abdomen. And this is just, again, your body is an overdrive trying to rid out all of this fiber that you've consumed. So just as I always say, listening to your body, maybe it's time to cut back on some of that fiber doesn't mean forever, but it just means in the moment.

Imbalanced Microbiome

And the last sign that your body will give you is that it could imbalance your microbiome, which seems very contradictive to what we hear all the time. Having a lot of diversity of foods can and fiber in our foods feeds our microbiome, which helps to make it a lot healthier and more robust. However, if we can consume the same types of fibers, that diversity can actually diminish. So it just kind of throws off your microbiome, and you'll be experiencing the bloating, the gas, or even bowel movement changes.

So these are just tips or signs rather that your body is saying, you know what? I don't need that much fiber, or I can't handle that much fiber right now. And so as you're listening to your body, which I encourage everybody to do, it's always telling us something.

Tips for Managing Fiber Intake

And so a few things, if you want to incorporate some fiber but not overdo it and have symptoms, number one is just start really slow. If your body's not acclimating to the amount of fiber you're having and you're experiencing some of these symptoms, just add in a little bit of fiber every day.

The next thing would make sure you drink a lot of water or at least enough water. And hydration is going to be so important for so many of our bodily functions. And when it comes to digestive stuff, water is extremely important.

And then of course, mix up our food. Have a diverse food plate that you eat. We all get into routines, so there's foods that we really like and there's foods that we're just not going to do. And so we typically lean into the foods that we like the most because they're either easy, we like them a lot, and we just get into a routine of it. But every week, every try to add in a different vegetable, change up the vegetables, add in different fruits if you can, different grains if you want. This just keeps your microbiome a lot more diverse and really supporting that system.

And of course, I already said it, but lastly, just listen to your gut. It is always talking to you. So I hope that this video just shared with you some ideas about how much fiber we can actually eat and excess, and what it can do for us. So it's not about not having it, it's about really dialing it in to how your body responds to it and how much it needs.

If you have questions, leave them down below, we love to answer.

I will also, just as a reminder, I'll link our website down below so you can make an initial appointment. If you're just feeling like I really need more help with my gut health, you can easily make that initial appointment.

So thanks for watching today, and we'll see you next time.

If you'd like to explore any of this information further or obtain an individualized nutrition plan, you can schedule an initial appointment at our clinic.  We also take insurance and some of our clients get full coverage, which is great.

Or you can just start by downloading our FREE GUIDE: 5 WAYS TO IMPROVE GUT HEALTH